slow dancing in a burning room
by La Reine Rouge
Summary: She is no longer a swirling puff of flame and danger. She is an extinguished candle, her wick burnt out. To her, I am simply a naïve antiques collector, keeping and protecting seemingly useless candles.


_Slow Dancing in a Burning Room_

I do not own The Hunger Games or any related characters. All rights reserved. 

-x-

I have to pretend, with all my will, with everything inside me, that Katniss still loves me. I know that she's slipping away from me. That's putting it optimistically – she has already slipped away from me, into the crevices of her mind. She does everything absentmindedly, as if invisible puppet strings dangle above her – she is the marionette, but because I feel so controlled by her, am I nothing but the puppet's puppet? Does she want me only because everyone else is gone? Does she want me only because I remind her of good times?

At night, I stay up and wonder all this, as I listen to her sob out one name after another: _Prim…Rue…Finnick…Cinna…Boggs_. The list goes on and on, until she reaches _Gale_ and all hell breaks loose. Her tears, contained, spill out, splashing on the sheets and soaking her pillow. I don't bother trying to hold her. She thrashes until I am forced to release her.

Gale Hawthorne was always the perpetual chip on my shoulder. While I spent years falling in love with Katniss, he simply appeared to her one day in the forest and she fell head over heels for him. At least, that's what it looks like, and no one has ever bothered to disprove me. I sometimes thank President Snow mentally for driving a wedge between Katniss and Gale.

Of course, I can't blame everything on him, although I wish I could. Pointing the blame at him, however, makes me feel better.

I feel like Katniss doesn't care about me, about anything, about herself most especially. She has lost herself, the spunk she once had, the fire that lighted her and ignited the entire Revolution. She is no longer a swirling puff of flame and danger. She is an extinguished candle, her wick burnt out. To her, I am simply a naïve antiques collector, keeping and protecting seemingly useless candles.

She does not speak to me. She speaks at me, her words hesitantly ringing out before they disappear. I am not Peeta Mellark to her, I am simply a male who is in her home. I am more than willing to speak, but she simply stares outside the window. I think she is lost to this world and is in another world, perhaps one with Gale, most certainly one in which Prim, Rue, Finnick, Cinna, Boggs, and the rest are alive. I wait for her to snap out of her reverie, baking bread to keep myself distracted. Understandably, she does not snap out of it. I cannot hold this sad but true fact against her, but my heart splits a little more with each passing day.

I try to keep the romance alive, but it seems to have died with Katniss's energy. I still love her, adore her, would die for her. She knows it. I think she chooses to ignore that fact, as she ignored all the other romantic things I said to her throughout the 74th and 75th Games, and in those private moments when we were alone. Or rather, as alone as two tributes and then victors were allowed to be.

Even though we technically spend most of our time together, I feel dreadfully alone. More alone than I felt when I practically buried myself in mud during the Hunger Games to save myself. More alone than I felt when I was being tortured by Snow and his lackeys. And there's nothing worse than feeling alone, especially when you're not physically alone.

I wait with every passing day, hoping that something will bring the former blaze back into her eyes.

Even visits from Haymitch Abernathy, former mentor and forever friend, are no longer the same. She stares at him hollowly every time he dares to even clear his throat. Haymitch's flame, similar to the one that seared Katniss's mind and sparked her temper, her passion, her emotion, has also died out. His omni-present flask of liquor has dulled into clearly watered-down wine, the lines etched into his forehead have multiplied, and his raspy, rough voice no longer seems as harsh. I feel as if I am staring at a silhouetted Haymitch.

He hasn't called her sweetheart or used sarcasm in months. I think he has forgotten how to. I said something ironically a week or two ago and they both stared at me before Haymitch let out a weak chuckle.

They are but molds of their former selves. Having lost so many old friends and the little stability he knew he controlled in his own life, Haymitch is but a cast of himself. His whitening hair is a chilling reminder that he is growing old – we all are. Katniss has developed faint lines around her mouth and her eyes crinkle at the corners. Although she has developed wrinkles at a younger age than most women, it is understandable. Most women have gone through only a fraction of what Katniss has.

These caricatures of friends, of a lover, are the only people I interact with in the deserted rubble of District 12. Haymitch once threatened to package us all off to a cushy district, threatening to send us all off to District 2.

At the mention of District 2, Katniss snapped to attention like a toy soldier. When Haymitch's face displayed all bluff, she sank back into her seat like a weary old veteran.

I suppose she is a weary old veteran.

What do they think when they look at me? I often wonder if they see pathetic remnants of the "charming", charismatic young man I used to be. In only a year or two, so much has changed that it would be impossible to assume that I have stayed the same. Of course, it is always much easier to find problems with other people than to find problems with yourself.

I look down at my hands, hands that have rubbed Katniss until she fell asleep, hands that have been scorched and beaten at the bakery ovens, hands that have settled down Haymitch from drunken stupor. Hands that have roamed around in the mud, trying to camouflage the rest of the body. I spend a lot of time looking at them and thinking. I spend a lot of time thinking in general, of the way things used to be and the way they are now and how events will proceed. I sit and wish for Haymitch to return to his former self, for Katniss to find herself. I spend all this time

Wishing.

Waiting.

Thinking.

Alone.


End file.
